It's February of 1979 and George Harrison's follow-up LP to his 1976 effort Thirty Three & 1/3 is ready to drop! With a multi-year gestation period akin to that of the break between All Things Must Pass and Living In The Material World, this new, self-titled LP was yet another warmly-received return to form for George. Light-hearted singles fare such as Blow Away and If You Believe sat neatly next to the beautiful contemplation of a Your Love is Forever, joined by the blasts from Beatles past such as the resurrected White Album cut Not Guilty. 70's producer dujour Russ Titelman alongside co-producer George brought a cohesion to this collection not seen on the Dark Horse's solo work for some time, helping George Harrison to go top 40 around the world and peaking at a respectable #12 in the US. While new Harri-songs were burning up the radio dials, Paul McCartney was not about to be outdone. The new hit Wings single Goodnight Tonight b/w Daytime Nighttime Suffering was the opening salvo of a new WINGS formation, and a hint of things to come later in the year...

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It's 1979! The world of music had evolved considerably since the demise of the fab four as a unified entity nearly a decade prior -- with punk rock, pub rock, disco and new wave bringing with them a parade of new artists making new sounds for a new generation. Which is not to say that Beatle music was no longer relevant, but amongst each former Beatle was a sliding scale of solicitude as to whether or not following current musical trends was worth their respective while. McCartney was turning the corner on the decade with some of the biggest chart-topping successes ever seen in popular music, while the yin to his yang enjoyed something more akin to retirement. John Lennon's so-called "house husband years" were indeed in full swing, and he began 1979 with family time, farm animal purchases, and travels abroad. George Harrison, too, indulged his non-music interests in the early days of the year, flying to Rio to witness the Gran Prix and rub shoulders with the major players in his increasingly prevalent passion: auto racing. But unlike John, George was far from abandoning the world of music -- and Harrison spent some time in early February with the BBC and (of all people) Michael Jackson discussing the new sounds of the day, his Beatle past, and his new self-titled album about to drop...

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1978 was a relative year of calm in the world of the former Beatles, with its own unique mix of musical and visual appearances (to varying degrees of success and reach) and the onset of familial stability in some, but not all cases (individual former Beatle mileage may vary). On August 1st, 1978, George and Olivia welcomed into the world their brand new baby boy, Dhani - and with him a wave of peace, love and inspiration for Harrison. John and Yoko too found solace in the warmth of family life, and in the fall announced a project that would document their journey in stage-musical form - The Ballad Of John and Yoko. Such a project would have been welcome to Lennon's fans, who were in their third consecutive year of John's self-proclaimed "house-husband period" - which of course offered not a single official release of new material beyond the odd contribution here or there. The critical and commercial failure of Ringo's Bad Boy LP ushered in an uncharacteristic era of quiet from Starr - whose hopes of reclaiming a hold on the top 10 dwindled more with each passing release. Paul McCartney was in no such slump, recording tracks for a new LP with his updated Wings line-up... and even assembling a super-group of rock's biggest stars for an orchestral-style rock and roll recording Macca dubbed "Rockestra". All this, and the release of a feature film centered around the Sgt.Pepper concept, as 1978 draws to a close...

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As Spring to turned to Summer in 1978, Paul McCartney was back in the business of rebuilding a Wings lineup -- a process all-too-familiar to the Maccas as a matter of course every few years since the band's inception. Jimmy McCulloch and Joe English left big shoes to fill - especially after having charmed the globe during the 1976 WINGS OVER THE WORLD tour...but fill those shoes the Maccas did, with the addition of scorching lead guitarist Lawrence Juber, and set-your-clock-to-it drumming courtesy of Steve Holly. Like birds flocking south for the winter, Paul, Linda, Denny, Lawrence and Steve found themselves shortly thereafter in the studio cutting tracks for yet another new Wings LP - while the vinyl was still cooling on the band's successful 1978 LP offering London Town. With Wings in the studio, Ringo Starr was busy making a last-ditch attempt to salvage the disastrous chart showing of his own latest LP Bad Boy, with a flurry of promotional activity that ultimately amounted to little. As Ringo and Paul worked away, George and John were in the midst of respective trips around the world - Harrison to Spain and Lennon to Japan...

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It's April, 1978, and Ringo Starr has a new album, a new TV special, and a new live performance in the works. First up the release of Starr's 7th post-Beatle LP, Bad Boy - a tighter, warmer departure from the previous year's effort Ringo The 4th. With highlight cuts like Hard Times, Heart On My Sleeve and Tonight, Ringo and producer (and longtime collaborator) Vini Poncia hoped to recapture the lightning in a bottle that was Ringo's self-titled 1973 effort -- but once again success proved elusive. Unlike former bandmate McCartney, whose solo work only grew in popularity since the demise of the fab four, Ringo's strong start was looking like diminishing returns by the later half of the 70's, and frustration was setting in. Ringo's self-titled TV special, released in conjunction with the Bad Boy album, was again a fun, fairly tight affair featuring co-stars such as the freshly white-hot Hollywood starlet Carrie Fischer. But like the album, Ringo's TV special came up short. Perhaps the biggest indicator of things to come from the entire project was a live concert performance filmed for the TV special - an "all star" cast if you will...

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It's March of 1978, and big expectations for a follow-up to Wings' ultra-successful Wings At The Speed of Sound record are mounting. Though it had been over a year since their ultra-successful WINGS OVER THE WORLD tour, audiences poured into stores in record numbers for a new single from Paul & company -- but would their LP follow suit? The answer came in the form of a resounding "yes", and the sixth album from the little (huge) band that could -- London Town -- arrived with both critical and commercial success. Though just shy of the #1 spot in the US, this softer, more relaxed collection was packed with the pastoral likes of I'm Carrying, Deliver Your Children, Girlfriend and more -- securing the McCartney domination of the mid-70s with tuneful flair. With Paul sitting pretty, former bandmate Ringo Starr worked away on his own new album (and accompanying TV special) which would feature an all-star cast and the former Beatle's first solo performance in front of a live audience...ever. Would the original "bad boy" come out on top? Stay tuned for part three of 1978 to find out...

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What was it that people loved so much about the pre-fab four? I think it was the trousers. But while mysteries may surround the appeal of Rutland's favorite sons, there's no mystery about the appeal of Lorne Michaels' epic Monty Python collaboration and Beatles tribute known as: THE RUTLES. Of course, plans were also in the works from the actual Beatles, starting with some new, optimistic compositions from George Harrison that signaled the coming of a follow-up to his successful Thirty Three & 1/3 album. As a refreshed, upbeat George commands his problems to blow away, Ringo Starr was setting his own sights on a reversal of fortune - choosing the songs which would comprise a new record...and a new TV Special. His comeback plans were ambitious, but a determined Ringo was not going to let the underperforming Ringo The 4th LP be the end of his hit-making in the 1970's. The Lennons, meanwhile, were dealing with a different kind of determination -- a terrorist organization which had been targeting John and Yoko for some time in an elaborate extortion scheme which necessitated the involvement of the FBI. All this on the eve of a new Wings album release - heralded by another monster hit single from Paul & co.: With A Little Luck. 

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The finale of 1977 is here, and so ends a year of relative peace and reflection for John, Paul, George and Ringo. After a break-neck start to the 1970's and the pulse-pounding culmination of the 1976 Wings World Tour, the former Beatles (on the whole) took this year to take a moment...before trekking onward to the next horizon. Ringo Starr's horizons looked markedly different in the fall of 1977 as they had in years prior, with his Ringo the 4th record seeing a dismal critical and commercial reception that would take the wind out of the sails of most any artist on the receiving end. Of course Ringo Starr is not just any artist, and an undeterred Ringo set forth at once to record yet another new album...one that he hoped would course-correct his recent misfortune. And speaking of course-correcting...Paul McCartney. If there were any doubt that Macca's star was still shining brightly in the later half of 1977, November's Capitol/EMI Wings single release of Mull of Kintyre b/w Girl's School was enough to silence naysayers and stun audiences around the world - becoming the former Beatle's biggest hit single ever outside of his aforementioned alma matar! All this plus a new Ringo release from Polydor to close out the year that was 1977...

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As summer turned to fall in the midst of 1977, the fab four legacy continued to loom large in the worlds of John, Paul George and Ringo... and indeed, the world at large. No such greater cultural compliment could be given than that of Lorne Michaels's new fab mock-umentary, The Rutles: All You Need Is Cash, which began filming on August 2nd. Dirk, Nasty, Stig and Barry's legend would last a lunchtime, and there to sit in on the feast was a host of comedy's elite: from SNL heavyweights like Bill Murray, John Belushi, Gilda Radner and Dan Aykroyd, to pythons such as Eric Idle...and of course one fourth of their inspiration, Mr. George Harrison. So enamored with the pre-fab four was George, that references to the Rutland sound and their infamous trousers would pop up in just about every interview "the quiet one" would give for years to come! While the hits of old were spoofed in masterful fashion, new hits were on the horizon as well...most notably in the new McCartney-Laine penned ode to Scotland, Mull of Kintyre. Paul's star continued its commercial climb with no sign of slowing down, but the success of his band Wings was put into jeopardy that September with Jimmy McCulloch and Joe English quit the band. With one former Beatle in damage control mode...Ringo Starr (the noisy one) forged ahead with a new LP release he hoped would undo the damage that his waning success over the last year had taken on his career. Thus the LP Ringo The 4th...a boogie-woogie beaucoup of sound that Ringo hoped would recapture his glory...but alas, it was not to be....

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nd Sean's trip to Asia ushers the family from Hong Kong to Karuizawa on a sight-seeing tour that would bring the Lennons closer to their matriarch's roots, and allow John some much-appreciated anonymity in the rural countrysides of their visit. Paul and Ringo, meanwhile, where knee-deep in recording efforts - be it as performing artists, label heads or in pseudonym masquerade. First up, Paul and Wings continue their Caribbean boat-side sessions for the still-untitled (but tentatively dubbed "Water Wings") sessions. Paul and Linda also put the finishing touches on some Linda McCartney originals nearly 5 years in the making - with the first official release of the "Suzy and the Red Stripes" single Seaside Woman b/w B-Side To Seaside. Ringo Starr was busy as ever recording his next LP effort, as well as music for a children's animated musical dubbed Scouse The Mouse. While activity was in no danger of slowing down for the former fabs, 1977 did seem to offer a bit of rest and reflection for John, Paul, George and Ringo in ways the quartet had never truly seen the likes of in their days under the scrutiny of the public eye...

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